


Before the Frozen Dawn

by Beleriandings



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Bittersweet, M/M, Sexual Content, mentions of past violence/trauma, somewhat fluffy in places
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-13
Updated: 2014-09-13
Packaged: 2018-02-17 07:04:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2300744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beleriandings/pseuds/Beleriandings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fingon spends a last night at Himring before returning to Hithlum.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before the Frozen Dawn

_Ever-cold_ , they call it, but, I often think, it is not so. Not really. When Findekáno comes, it seems just a little warmer, the very air bright with anticipation of the first spring thaws. Maybe, I even go so far as to think sometimes, it is my own heart that has begun to thaw out. More likely, it is simply the fact that the arrival of a royal party sets off a flurry of activity around the castle and the citadel, with wagons bearing extra food and wine and fuel to feed the guests and warm the extra rooms in the castle that are sealed off the rest of the time, unheated, straw packed into the cracks in the doors for warmth. But my uncle the high king dislikes sending his son without a sizeable party, a measure meant to keep Findekáno safe, and one that I heartily approve of.

And so, though Findekáno would have gladly saddled a horse and simply ridden away on his own one day, hair flying in the wind, to my side – I cannot help but smile at that thought – there is always a retinue. Findekáno does his duty to his father, and, I reflect, it is probably well for my own people up here on the bleak summit of Himring Hill, ( _an outpost among outposts_ , Macalaurë likes to call it, or a  _bloody freezing rock_  when he is feeling less charitable) to mix with others from outside once in a while. Talk and news from outside is good for the spirit, I had realised, early on.

(“And what of  _your_  spirit?” Findekáno had said with a hint of a smile, when I had told him that. “Beyond hope” I had replied, trying to make it in into a joke, but our laughter had died on our lips.)

He leaves tomorrow, though, and I turn to him as we stand on the walls, the chill wind tugging at our cloaks and lifting our hair as the sun begins to sink below the hills of Dorthonion. The bloody light of sunset catches in the bright ribbons he wears in his hair. He turns to see me watching him.

“When will you be back?” I ask him.

“As soon as I possibly can be.” He frowns, blinking a little and shaking his head as the wind picks up, blowing a fine, tangled net of his hair across his face. He looks troubled. “But I am not leaving yet.”

“Soon enough” I say, loneliness rising unbidden in me.

He looks up into my face. “On the morrow.” He smiles, conspiratorially. “A lot can happen in a night, you know Maitimo.”

“As you have been so capably demonstrating these past days.” I cannot help but smile myself, and I long to pull him into my arms, to kiss him as the wind rises around us. But we are in public, out on the walls of my own fortress, and it would be improper. Instead I reach out and take his hand discretely, weaving our wind-chilled fingers together.

He curls his hand into a fierce grip in mine. “Care for one more demonstration before I leave?”

———-

It grows dark, and after the changing of the watches (which I make it my habit to be present for) we excuse ourselves and weave our way amongst the lit braziers, down the stairs into the great courtyard, and to my own tower room. We order some hot, spiced wine to be brought to us in the solar that joins onto my bedchamber, and once the servant has left and the door has closed with a click, Findekáno sits down opposite me, taking my hand in his once more. He looks deep into my eyes, before pouring an earthenware cup of wine from the small cauldron, taking my hand again and curling it around the warm cup, before wrapping both of his own hands around it.

I let the warmth seep through my hand for a moment, realising how cold it truly had been out there only now as the knots in the joints of my fingers relax a little, the stiffness leaving them. They have never been quite the same since they were broken and healed again, bone knitting together crookedly many times over. I suppose none of me has. My face twists involuntarily as pain lances through the place where my missing hand would be; even after so many years I can practically feel the finger joints flexing and aching as they warm up, although there is nothing there.

Findekáno must have seen me grimace. “Does it hurt?” he asks quietly.

I see little point in trying to pretend otherwise. With him, at least I do not feel I need to. “Yes” I say shortly. “A little. The cold and the heat…” I withdraw my true hand from his gently, flexing my fingers.

“I am sorry.” He takes my hand in both of his, being exquisitely gentle all the while. He kisses the knuckles, one by one. I smile gently, watching his thick black eyelashes brush his cheeks. His lips are very soft against my skin.

“Findekáno.”

He lays my hand back down on the table between us, and I raise it to his face, running the backs of my fingers down his cheek. Such smooth skin he has; my own skin is laced by a network of scars, ridged and puckered in places, never smooth. Never beautiful, anymore. The touch of Findekáno’s skin is something I always miss when he is away, a wonder that never loses its novelty. I know, also, that I am not merely imagining that the golden-brown smoothness of Findekáno’s cheek is a shade paler than it was even the last time we were together. I know how little he likes to be shut up inside for long periods of time.

“I worry about you” he says, echoing my thoughts. He places his hand over mine against his cheek, before picking up the cup and taking a sip of the wine. He interrupts me before the protest is out of my mouth. “I know! I know what you would say. But still, I worry that you grow melancholy.”

He offers the cup to me and I take a thoughtful sip before answering him. The wine is hot and sweet, the spice flavours coiling at the back of my throat, warming me. “I have plenty to keep me busy, as I have told you many a time. I am happy, in my way.” I pause. “But yes, I do occasionally slip into days when I miss you…” my voice stops in my throat, and I clear it “…more acutely than usual, I mean.”

“Yes” says Findekáno heavily. “Yes, I know exactly what you mean.”

He sighs and gets to his feet, walking around the table to stand behind my chair. I feel the warm weight of his arms about my shoulders. He leans forward so that he is holding me, his chin resting on my shoulder. “Maitimo” he whispers, muffled by my hair. He kisses my ear. “Maitimo, Maitimo. I wish I never had to let you go.”

I turn my head, kissing him slowly, softly. He leans over me, cupping my cheeks in his hands. I break the kiss, getting to my feet to stand beside him.

“You don’t have to, not yet anyway.” I smile. “Besides, who was it that was telling me that a lot can happen in a night?”

He kisses me, more urgently this time, and he is pushing me backwards and I am stumbling against a low bookcase, throwing my hand out to steady myself.

“Careful, Maitimo” his mouth quirks up into a smile; I can feel it against my neck. “You wouldn’t want to damage anything now, would you? That would be very careless of you.”

“Terribly” I say lightly, before letting my hand flash out and catch him around the waist, knocking him off balance. Findekáno yelps in surprise as he falls against my chest and I find myself grinning.

I let him wrestle me down onto the divan next to the hearth, let him lean over me and run his fingers through my loose hair, still tangled from the wind on the battlements. I let him kiss my cheeks, my throat, my mouth, my eyelids as the fire burns low. Then he is in my arms, and we are tugging at each others’ clothes like the impatient youths we once were (and yet so, so different, several worlds away and a lifetime ago; a life that is gone) and our fingers are clumsy on the buttons and laces. I let him run his fingers over my skin, relearning every scar etched there, although I still do not understand how he can find me beautiful.

 _He_  is beautiful, I think, with his eyes falling half closed and his skin glowing golden in the firelight. Findekáno’s hair tumbles down his shoulders in lazy black ringlets, chased with gold, pooling around both of us. I let him lay my body bare and stretched out full length on the cushions, then touch me, take me in his mouth, feel him wringing little whimpering cries from me with his skilful tongue, his hands that flicker over my skin.

Silence was something I learned in the darkness;  _do not make a sound, do not cry out. Do not let them hear._  But Findekáno can always free my voice, though still it comes out all wrong. It is different than it once was, cries that involuntarily sound almost as much like pain as they do like pleasure, although his caresses are gentle and tender.

I love him beyond reason; he has saved me in more ways than I can count, more ways than even he knows, but even Findekáno cannot entirely put me back together again. I try to do what I can to please him; it is not so easy as it once was, with only one hand, but over the years I have learned to work around that. Findekáno’s deep breaths that hitch as I touch him, his short, sharp moans and exclamations are maddening, intoxicating to me. Afterwards we lie tangled in each others’ arms for a long while as our skin cools. Findekáno lies half over my chest, curling close to me as though to shield me from the world, and his hair falls about us both in inky waves as the firelight glows against our skin. For a long time we simply lie there, saying nothing.

————

Much later I wake with a ragged shout, clawing hair from my face where it has fallen across my mouth and nose, smothering me. For a moment the world lurches and my mind spirals in freefall, and I have no idea where I am. For a brief, lightening flash of an instant, pure panic sluices through my body like ice water.

A voice. “Maitimo?”

Then, as quickly as it had come, the sickening disorientation is bleeding away; I realise I am in my own bed, in my own tower, safe within my hilltop fortress, and that Findekáno is next to me. He has caught my wrist, where I must have lashed out on waking in panic, as if to ward off a blow. I immediately feel guilty.

“Fin…” I try to take my arm from his as memory returns, of the previous evening, of moving to the bed, of eventually falling asleep in Findekáno’s arms after many hours. “…I’m sorry.” The words are not enough. “Did I hurt you…?”

“No, Maitimo.” He releases my wrist cautiously, his voice thick. “Are you… were you dreaming again?” Tentatively, as though asking for permission with his very motions, he pushes back the hair that has fallen across my face, smoothing it gently behind my ear. It is soaked with cold sweat, I notice, with some distaste.

I think for a moment before I answer his question. Had I been dreaming? Surely I had, for I dream most nights, dark things that come in flashes, ragged and incoherent. I barely remember those dreams when I wake. Sometimes there are fully formed nightmares, but those I tend to remember in vivid detail when I awaken; today there was only that sick feeling of not knowing where I was, my sense of place torn from me violently as the tail ends of the dream slipped away. “Yes” I admit. “But nothing out of the ordinary. Go back to sleep, Fin.”

“Maitimo…” There is pain in Findekáno’s voice. He sits up and lays his head on my shoulder, putting one arm around me and drawing me to him. I bow my head, my forehead pressed against his chest, listening to his heartbeat as he holds me. I listen to my own heartbeat too; after a while it slows down until it is almost normal and the blood beating in my ears is no longer a roar. I lick my dry lips, drawing back and looking at Findekáno. “I suppose you are going to lecture me about - ”

“Maitimo.” His voice has a brittle edge. “I’m not going to lecture you about anything. I’m worried about you, but this… this is  _not your fault_. If you are in pain, if you have nightmares… it’s not a flaw in you. You are  _brave_. You are  _so_  brave, and so strong. Do you understand?”

I lie back on the pillows, feeling a little calmer. I sigh heavily, rubbing my eyes. “Yes, Fin.”  _In this moment at least._

He lies down beside me, gathering me into his arms. “Good.”

After a while Findekáno’s breathing grows deeper and more even, and soon after that I too must have fallen asleep.

———-

The next day, the royal party are all assembled in the main courtyard to begin their return journey. I draw myself up tall, pulling the russet fur collar of my cloak closer around my throat against the cold. The sky is milky white, the clouds hanging low over the top of the hill. As the horses toss their heads, the first flakes of snow begin to fall. They catch in Findekáno’s hair and on the wolfskin and rich blue wool of his cloak, and he turns to me and smiles, a smile that I know he hopes will leave me with enough warmth to last me through a season until I see him next.

We have already said our true goodbyes, in my bedchamber when we rose before the sun this morning, but now we clasp forearms, and I bow and kiss Findekáno’s thickly gloved hand formally. Then he touches me on the crown of the head and I rise to my feet as he signals to his riders to mount up, before swinging himself up onto his own horse with his usual fluid grace. But I know that he is in pain; I feel it too.

He rides from the courtyard and out of the gates in a light flurry of snowflakes that will likely fade to nothing as he leaves the high slopes of the Marches. His head is held high, his neck stiff; by now I know well the look of one trying hard not to look back when I see it. After he is gone I stand there for a while staring at the closed gate with my jaw set, before I turn resolutely away as the cold descends once more. I will not let it freeze my heart though. I must not.


End file.
